mandag 12. november 2012

I was a lucky winner of Bioware's facebook competition and was invited to meet them at Gamex. And I love their approach to their fans. While others might give out some free stuff at thier booth, Bioware invited their fans to a medieval inspired feast where they brought in Senior Writer David Gaider and Creativ Director Mike Laidlaw via Skype for questioning. And they even got Mark Meer, MaleShep voice actor, on Skype for a geeky chat.

Lion Martinez (the man organizing this gathering) wearing a new armor at the feast.

And Gamex was awesome in general, mostly because I walked around in cosplay accompanied by a fantastic femShep by Karin Olava Pettersen. My favourite moment was me as Tali dancing with Shepard at the Wii booth.

Don't worry, Chris Priestly filmed it all

Awkward elevator ride

And I got to be on stage with Holly Conrad, Bioware's official FemShep. And she is amazing, giving us a lot of tips on making costumes and just chatting about techniques and sculpting.

On stage with Karin Olava Pettersen and Holly Conrad

One of the best parts was that I felt that everyone from Bioware was genuinely interested in me and wanted to hear my opinions and give me feedback. They greeted us in hallways and reminded us to see their panels (as winners we get to enter before the rest, securing god seats)

I love being VIP

And we also got free stuff of course, my favorite being the signed Mass Effect art book and the limited Dragon Age necklace.

The upgrader from Big Sister is the body suit, which is simply a white long tshirt and thights sewn together with a zipper added to the front. other details are sewn or painted on using a reference picture. The helmet is also improved. Better padding and bolts on the lower part and new green leds. The red ones are still there in case I want to go for Big Sister again. See this post for how I made these parts:

torsdag 8. november 2012

I was asked how I pack my costumes when I need to bring them on an airplane. Under you can se my suitcase from my trip to Gamex. You might recall from earlier posts that I brought my Tali and Liara cosplays. The advantage with these costumes is that they are made mostly of textile parts which are fairly easy to pack.

Some tips:

If you have a hard cover suitcase then your possessions are more protected, let's it the people handling your luggage isn't wearing silk gloves.

Fill hollow props, like my Tali shoes. Inside I have stored the arm gauntlets for Tali and Liara, thus protecting them and supporting the shoes.

Use plastic boxes, the Asari head piece color off on clothes and shouldn't be squashed. The same goes for my Tali helmet and the M5 Phalanx gun; they would crack or get destroyed in impact.

The asari head piece and the helmet still smell of chemicals due to last minute touch ups before flight, the boxes keep that smell away from the rest of the suitcase content.

Disassemble, I was able to take off the visor of the Tali helmet, making it easier to store. Try to plan out possibilities to disassemble when designing your prop. See BettcanardDesign, she made the chainsaw from Lollipop Chainsaw and was able to take of the blade.

tirsdag 6. november 2012

I just made a facebook page for my designs, props and cosplay. I will use it to post more wip pictures on the go and present photos of my work in albums. Here you will find more elaborate descriptions of how I make my costumes.Be sure to check me out.

I made a new Tali helmet for my meeting with Bioware at Gamex and I got Holly Conrad, Jessica Merizan and "Evil" Chris Priestly to sign it. Awesome. I will post more about my adventure with Bioware later.

All about me:

Hello, I’m Christina also known as Chrix Design. I’m a software tester by day, costume maker by night. Most of my life I have been a little "know it all" and very creative. This evolved into me being a science nerd as a child as well as I sewed my own Barbie clothes. In the end I got a Master’s degree in Industrial design engineering. My childhood was also full of video games and my first prop came together mainly because I wanted a Portal Gun over my fireplace. I exploited every occasion to dress up and loved making more and more original costumes. It wasn't until 2011 I heard about cosplay, where had it been all my life! I got so many friends with the same passions for games, costumes, craft and books as me. After this I had no more spare time, there was always a costume to build a tutorial to write and new friends to meet. But I won’t say no to a round of Halo, an evening of board games or watching old Disney movies.
You can contact me at chrix.design.props@gmail.com or via my facebook page.